Phleboholic
by Lisa Von Cooper
Summary: Our story begins at the Fairy World Games and shall end on the day of Anti-Cosmo's execution. What comes between those two events? Deep despair, crippling anxiety, ever-hopeful love ... and an addiction that threatens to destroy everything.


**I was inspired to write this by the episode "Fairly Oddlympics" and by another fanfic called "My Evil Godchild". It takes a darker turn than both those sources, however, and Anti-Cosmo will probably end up sounding slightly out-of-character at times. I'm also not telling the tale in chronological order because I'm still sorting out the finer details of the plot.**

 **This story is rated T just to be safe. There shouldn't be anything explicit, but the content matter is probably a little too scary for younger readers. It's about addiction, so consider that your trigger warning.**

 **I hope you like the first chapter (even if it is a little short)!**

 **P.S. The word "phleboholic" was based on "alcoholic", replacing the first part with "phlebo", meaning "vein".**

 **PHLEBOHOLIC**

 _ **After: A Shell of a Man**_

His throat is as dry as the desert sands and burns twice as fiercely.

He clutches the sides of the mattress to stop his hands shaking. He winces and gasps uncontrollably; he's sweating and shivering at the same time. He's parched. He needs a drink. He needs it now more than ever.

"Hello?" he calls, voice cracking. "Is anyone there?"

He receives no reply.

"Anti-Wanda? Crumpet?"

Still nothing. He's completely alone.

"Please!" he begs, sitting up. "Help me! I can't stand this for much longer! I need-"

He clamps a clawed hand over his mouth to muffle the request. He mustn't ask for it. He won't get it. Worse than that, though, is the chance that he will get it. And then what? Brief release – before the tremors and palpitations comes back with a vengeance.

He bites his fingers. He doesn't release them from his mouth, not even when he starts tasting the salty inky-blue magical vapour drifting from the wounds.

For how long has he been here, gripped by thirst, fighting to rein in every animal instinct in his body? For how long has he wriggled and writhed on this uncomfortably lumpy mattress? For how long has he been pounding the stone floor with his fists until they are blackened and bruised, just to distract himself from the craving?

For how long has this azure-skinned creature been locked in this dingy hemispherical cell, blending into the darkness? For how long has he been craning his neck to spy the only exit, a trapdoor in the domed roof – a trapdoor that resolutely shuts out his desperate wails before they can reach a sympathetic ear?

He's a wreck. An object of pity to a few. An object of revulsion to the majority.

He lies back, rolls over and curls into a ball, his wet fingers violently trembling, his rusty chains rattling about him. What else can he do? Were he to furiously flap his leathery bat-like wings and reach for the exit, he would go nowhere, pinned to the ground by the shackles around his wrists.

He squeezes his eyes shut. He needs to sleep. When he's asleep, he can distract himself from his miserable reality. He can pretend his relentless desires are finally being satisfied. But there's no chance of that happening right now. Not when his lungs are heaving with the effort of breathing. Not when his hummingbird heart is pounding against his ribcage.

There's a sticky patch on the floor. He hits it with his head. The pain strikes a space above his eyes and ripples all over his brain. But he doesn't cry out. He just hits his head again. And again. Harder. Harder. Harder.

His body fails to support him. He collapses. Deep pink splodges dance around his eyes. He sinks into unconsciousness. Before he fades out completely, something happens. As much as he hates it, he cannot stop his mind calling forth a memory from that day.

The day that changed his life…

…

Jorgen Von Strangle – the greatest (and buffest) competitor at the Fairy World Games – lies at Timmy Turner's feet, felled like an oak, gold medals scattered like a halo around his head. The boy and his fairy godparents, Cosmo and Wanda, have been stunned into silence. They wait for their only hope of winning to wake up.

He doesn't.

H.P., the grey-clad leader of the pixies, greets his rivals with a thin smile. "You fairies know you're nothing without Jorgen," he intones, his monotone voice betraying none of his glee. Anti-Cosmo, a good friend of his, lingers by his side with a nearly-identical grin.

"That's not true!" Timmy leaps in. "Fairies are amazing, and they can totally beat you without Jorgen."

"Oh, really?" Anti-Cosmo swoops down to Timmy's level and examines him through his monocle. "Care to put your money where your bucktoothed mouth is?"

"Bring. It. On!"

"Okay," H.P. starts, "if the fairies win, like you say, we'll do anything you want."

"Sounds fair."

"But if the anti-fairies win" – and here their _de facto_ leader conjures a vision of a gloomy bedroom, complete with cobwebs and a bear rug – "you will accompany me back to Anti-Fairy World and will be my evil godchild FOREVER!"

"Come again?" Timmy's face blanches.

"And if the pixies win," H.P. finishes, making the Gothic scene merge into that of a sterile workstation surrounded by piles of paper, "you will accompany me back to Pixie World and will be my evil office boy forever."

The world turns back to normal. By now a crowd has gathered in the middle of the racetrack, pressing in on Timmy, waiting to see what his reaction will be.

"Don't do it, sport," Wanda insists, "because there is a good chance we really do stink without Jorgen." As she speaks, her husband flies towards a soccer ball at great speed, comes into contact with it and crashes to the ground.

"Yes," drones H.P., "don't do it, Turner, because…" Both evil leaders break into mocking clucks of cowardice.

Timmy frowns. "You're on!"

"WHAT?!" Cosmo and Wanda yelp together.

All the other fairies gasp.

Wanda grabs the front of her godchild's shirt. "Timmy, that's crazy!"

Scott Hamilton skates past in a chicken costume. "I'm Commander Cluck-Cluck," he declares, "Chicken King of This Dream!"

Timmy looks at Wanda. "No, that's crazy."


End file.
